30 Kisses
by Kitachi
Summary: 30 kisses shared between Hitsugaya Toshiro and Hinamori Momo. How they met, how they became the people they were, how they fell in love, and everything in between.


Version: Gamma

Restrictions: None

Pairing: Hitsugaya Toshiro/Hinamori Momo

Theme: Shriek

Genre: Humour

* * *

><p>A simple shriek started it all. He would later find out that she was looking over her shoulder while being chased, and only just turned around in time to see him and scream.<p>

It was the hottest day of the millennium, or so some folks might have said. And from the shade of their houses with their hand fans and their feet in buckets of cool water fetched from the well, that would be saying a lot. Hitsugaya Toshiro scowled into the sky. _Another summer spent toiling in the dirt._ Shading his eyes and cursing the midday sun, he dragged the wooden cart one-handed along the street. Toshiro concentrated hard on putting one foot in front of the other. He ignored the excited shouts of the other children who ran barefoot and half-naked toward the local creek, shrugged off their infectious laughter, and paid no mind to the dust kicked up into his eyes. What he could not ignore was the subtle way they manoeuvred around him, careful to keep their distance, even in the rush and excitement of play. It was instinct, Obaa-san had told him, that made them apprehensive.

On days like these Toshiro was thankful for the space. He wondered, sometimes, how they could stand being so close to one another in the stifling heat. Toshiro felt the air around him stir and vibrate as the heat got too much. Too many familiar sensations prickled at his awareness. The blood in his veins, the sweat on his brow, the humidity that licked at his skin; it was everything he hated about summertime. He could have turned around and gone home, he could have even left his cart and found somewhere quiet to sit and be by himself - but Obaa-san was waiting for him; Obaa-san, who had taken him in twenty years ago when he first arrived in Rukongai; Obaa-san, who had sprained her ankle and could not accompany him today. So on he walked, watching the small clouds of dust his footsteps made, the sounds of the slums falling short of the negative space some unknown force cloaked him in.

'_Kyaah!' _

A shrill cry of panic, piercing through his barrier, was all the warning Toshiro got. The cool air that swirled around his body ensured that he did not collapse from heat exhaustion, but for all it's worth it could not stop the solid mass that slammed him into the ground.

Pain blossomed in the back of his head, but all that mattered was the bruising pressure on his mouth and the taste of blood on his tongue. How long was this person going to lay there?

'Eww! Momo kissed the freak!'

All at once Toshiro became aware of the crowd that had gathered around them. He shoved the mass off of him and scrambled away. There were eyes on him. Toshiro stared disbelievingly at the girl who lay sprawled on the ground where he had thrown her. A few children gathered around her and helped her up.

Toshiro simply sat there. No one offered a hand.

The crowd moved away quickly, finding little else of interest, but the girl stayed behind. _Baka._ She didn't seem to be afraid of him in the least, and there was also the issue of breaking through his wall of silence. Instead of shying away, she hurried over and held her hand out. It was small and calloused, much like his own, but where his hands were bony and awkward, hers looked slender; they had a delicacy about them. He batted the proffered limb away, ignoring the searing heat of her skin, and stood on his own.

Immediately, he felt his eye twitch. She was - she was taller. Taller. Than. Him. Only by a little bit, but still she was taller. Toshiro gave her his best manly-man glare. How dare she interrupt his dramatic-over-the-top-brooding time? He only ever got to pretend to be all dark and haunted and unrealistically damaged when Obaa-san wasn't watching. He felt the ghost of her hands pinching his cheeks into submission and shuddered. Toshiro _deserved _his angsting, if only for putting up with the local Seer-slash-crazy-woman. Besides; it made him look cool.

'Ano; here,' she said, holding out a ragged - but surprisingly clean - cloth. 'For your lip,' she added quickly, seeing his confusion. 'I'm sorry for - for running into you.' She finished this with a small bow.

Rage was an emotion Toshiro thought he'd been familiar with. He recalled every time someone pointed out his (perfectly adequate) height as a form of mockery, remembering how he would see red, how his anger would freeze with the cold white ice of a thousand tundra. There was that one time somebody tried to steal from Obaa-san while they were at the market; back then there was the kick of adrenalin that set him off on a bloody rampage. What he was feeling right then could be compared to those times. _Yes_, he reasoned, _similar - though not quite. There_ was the adrenalin, _there_ were the shaking hands, _there_, racing pulse, and _there, _the lack of breath. But instead of _seeing_ red, he _went_ red. Toshiro felt his face heat up, even as the cool air surrounding him expanded and dropped in temperature by a few more degrees, wrapping itself around the girl in the process.

The girl's eyes widened in what he assumed to be fear. _Finally._ Toshiro was just beginning to wonder if the girl was a half-wit. Rather than running away as he expected however, she gasped and looked around. 'Is that you? Are you making it cold?'

Toshiro panicked. 'I - no of course not. No!' This was the first time in a long time (eighteen years, ten months, and five and a half days; but who was counting?) that someone had caught him like this out in public. The girl looked like she didn't believe him though. Her eyes went wider and she gasped, pointing at him. 'Don't - '

'_Sugoi...' _

Toshiro stared. '_HAH_?'

The girl started for a moment, but regained her composure and shook her head. 'I can only do light, and sometimes if I'm lucky I can make two at a time. How do you do it? Doesn't it make you tired? I always feel dizzy if I make them too big...'

Toshiro stood, blinking, as the girl kept going on and on about being able to make lights, and going to some big academy.

'...But they said I shouldn't. I really want to try though, do you think I could do it?' She paused for the first time in three minutes, 'Ah, you've been so nice to listen to me and we don't even know each other's names! I'm Hinamori Momo. You can call me Momo if you want, I'm not very fussy about that sort'a thing. I wonder why everyone els- '

'Toshiro,' he said, cutting in, 'Hitsugaya Toshiro.' Quickly, he grabbed the handle of his rickety wooden cart and stalked off in what he hoped was a menacing way. Rounding the corner and entertaining notions that he had left the mouth that was Hinamori Momo behind, Toshiro nearly tripped over when he heard her shout at him.

'It was nice to meet you Shiro-kun!'

Shiro-kun? _Shiro-kun!? _Hitsugaya Toshiro felt the muscles around his eye twitch again, but fought the urge to turn around and give Momo a piece of his mind. It was, at the very least, better than being called "freak".


End file.
